Infect me with your love (fill me with your poison)
by ibuzoo
Summary: Tom's voice whispers dark in her mind, reminds her that special circumstances require special treatment and she thinks with the rapidness of a peregrine. She comes home that night and searches through Tom's folders, neatly sorted files with evidences and leverage about every single student until she finds Cormac's record, flips through it. She blackmails him the next day.


**Infect me with your love (fill me with your poison)**

**Prompt: **Growth

**Rating:** M

**Warnings:** Modern AU / Organised Crime AU / Killer AU / Mention of Death and Blood

**Word count:** 1002

**A/N: **I had so many difficulties with this prompt. First I thought I should do an AU about growing up but then I thought about this one and how the darkness that radiates from Tom affects Hermione's own behavior. It grows from fragment to fragment.

* * *

><p><strong>o.<strong>

We're all born with chastity, we're all born pure but it's taken from us as soon as we grow up.

* * *

><p><strong>i.<strong>

First it is nothing, a stain that she shrugs off easily, like a spurious crumb that you need to flick off your new cashmere scarf.

They have an assignment together, Hermione and MacLaggen, a large boy with curly blond hair and a mind that's not even half as clever as he insists he is. She tries to reason with him, even proposes to write their part alone so they wouldn't get a bad mark but the boy is boastful and his face gets red as soon as he pumps his muscles, tries to intimidate her. It's utterly frustrating to get through his thick head while Tom's voice whispers dark in her mind, reminds her that special circumstances require special treatment and she thinks with the rapidness of a peregrine and it just clicks, happens without an afterthought. She comes home that night and searches through Tom's folders, neatly sorted files with evidences and leverage about every single student until she finds Cormac's record, flips through it until something precious falls into her hands.

She blackmails him the next day.

* * *

><p><strong>ii.<strong>

There's a particular scent on her tongue, something succulent and rich but she can't name it, not yet. Tom's voice in the back of her mind is grey, and she disregards that it grows and grows and grows.

* * *

><p><strong>iii.<strong>

It's a trifle, a bagatelle that she wrestles with her conscience the moment it happens.

Jarring clamour echoes from the walls and Hermione watches the man who's shackled to the chair in front of her, observes the way he tries to rip the ropes on his wrists to free himself while his eyes beseech her to end this torture. Rosier rips at his dark hair and the man screams out once more, a thin trail of blood and saliva drips out of his mouth and Greyback's brawny, chunky fist hits his upper jaw with a crunchy, cracking sound - a second later he vomits blood and enamel.

Tom's eyes rest on her body and she feels uncomfortable with the way he examines her, the way he presses her conscious to react a certain kind of way. Her gaze is volatile, never rests longer on a single thing until she spots a spiders web just over Rosier's head.

She starts to count the drops of morning dew that cling to it and cuts out everything else.

* * *

><p><strong>iv.<strong>

Her mouth goes dry and the taste grows copper, bitter while her mind grows darker, almost black but she convinces herself it's not Tom's work, not his triumph.

* * *

><p><strong>v.<strong>

They agree that this is absolute necessity and nothing less.

Pictures of the talking statues of Rome cover the table with Hermione's notes and a lot of different articles - all of them dealing with Italy and the cultural aspect of long forgotten mythology - are spread over mahogany wood. She sighs exasperated as soon as Rabastan enters the room and delivers the news that their last order has been a disaster, a failure that he admits between clenched teeth. Tom's fingers stop typing on his shiny silver Macbook and he looks up to Hermione, shares an intimate glance with her while something dangerous glistens behind the grey, something predatory that pushes her out of her shell.

"Send Greyback to deal with it," she finally says and it amazes her how cold her voice sounds, how impassive and smooth. Rabastan hesitates but Tom drawls amused, "Now, now Lestrange, you heard the Lady" and a second later she can hear the fading steps of fine Italian leather on the wooden floor. His eyes are still fixed on her but Hermione ignores it, takes her notes again and reads.

* * *

><p><strong>vi.<strong>

The darkness around her almost consumes her and it grows larger with each passing day while she bites her lips, sucks them until she tastes blood.

* * *

><p><strong>vii.<strong>

She's not responsible for anyone else, it's a coincidence after all.

Tom draws the weapon with a swift motion of his delicate hands - the hands of a lover, of a pianist - and he pushes the trigger four times in a row until Cedric Diggory hits the ground. Blood trickles out of the holes in his chest and pours into a small puddle, almost reaches Hermione's champagne buckskin boots. She waits until the tips of her soles are soaked carmine red, then turns around and leaves.

* * *

><p><strong>viii.<strong>

Not everything in darkness is black and dead, not everything is bitter. Because sometimes, rarely, blood red Daylily grow too, and she picks them one by one and braids them in her auburn hair.

* * *

><p><strong>ix.<strong>

In her mind she calls it self defence.

_(it's a lie)_

The gun weighs heavy in her slender hands and she feels them unwittingly shake, almost as if the guilt kicks in but Tom is right behind her, kisses the top of her head and he takes the gun out of her grip, switches on the safety before he tucks it between his jeans and his shirt on his back. She leans against his chest and breathing feels suddenly a lot easier while she watches dead Myrtle on the floor and how her blood leaves the same puddle as Cedric's weeks ago.

"We couldn't risk it", she murmurs and her voice is calm with an icy edge, something that makes her fear herself and Tom nods, breathes at her nape, leaves kisses right on top while goosebumps raise her skin. He whispers, "No, we couldn't."

It's enough.

* * *

><p><strong>x.<strong>

She'd never admit that the darkness had already grown so large that it swallowed her a long time ago, so she swallows the blood in her mouth and stays silent.

* * *

><p><strong>xi.<strong>

We're all born with chastity, we're all born pure but it's taken from us as soon as we grow up.

_(bleeding Daylily leave dark crimson stains on the black fabric of her dress and she smiles, secret and cruel)_

She's grown up now.


End file.
